The Second Coming
by glanmire
Summary: Dean is falling into alcoholism, Cas is dead and Sam is trying to fight a monster, and all the while the skies grow darker.


It was a blind sort of day. The sky was dark and Dean was drunk.  
>"C'mon Dean, c'mon, you're fine," Sam coaxed as he ushered his older brother into the Impala. He wanted them up and out before too many people could witness the sorry state his brother was in, but Dean being Dean, wasn't making it easy.<p>

"Immmfine Sammy, lemme go," Dean protested, and managed to slip from Sam's grasp and stagger to the car himself.  
>Sam waited for the inevitable. It was all of three seconds later when Dean embraced the gravel with open airs, scraping his palms.<br>"Told ya," Sam muttered, and helped him up. "Don't make me fireman-carry you," he warned as Dean battered away his hand. That threat must have resonated at some level with Dean, as he accepted Sam's help, albeit ungratefully.

Sam strapped his brother into the passenger seat, fussing over him, knowing it would irk him. "Sam," Dean growled, his head lolling to one side. "What?" Sam asked innocently, and then added under his breath, "If you don't want to be babied, don't render yourself useless."

He regretted the comment instantly, but it was too late to repair the damage.  
>Dean's mouth went tight, and his hands flailed. Sam ducked but not fast enough, and a fist connected with his jaw, though it didn't hurt too bad. There was no strength in Dean's punches anymore.<p>

Sam threw himself into the driver's side and began backing out and away from the motel.  
>"Who said you were allowed drive?" Dean spat. The humour of moments ago was gone, and yeah, it was all Sam's fault- he made one mean comment, one, and he was the one getting snapped at.<br>He clenched his hands around the wheel, like he was strangling a neck, but didn't reply. He didn't want to bait Dean further.  
>Dean mumbled incoherently to himself for a while, and eventually fell asleep, snoring softly along to the roar of the engine.<p>

The night before, Dean elected gone out after Sam had already called it quits for the night. He didn't even make excuses anymore, just pulled on his jacket and left.  
>It was about five in the morning when Sam awoke- he slept lightly these days- but he didn't immediately know what had startled him, then he heard it; the soft, pathetic noises coming from just outside the motel door, a scrambling sound against the handle.<br>Sam got out of bed and pulled it open, and in tipped Dean, key hanging limply in his hand. Evidently he hadn't been able to get it in the lock.

Dean was praying, not that Sam knew. Not for help to get the key in the lock- he wasn't that shallow- but his usual correspondence.  
>"yo Cas, yo Castiel man," he began, and although he was pissed drunk there was a certain level of coherency to his prayer.<br>"Shit no that's not right, amen, nope that's how you end 'em, uh, okay, hey. Yeah, hey. How you doin' Cas? Stupid question. You're dead.  
>But hey Cas? Are you dead? As in really dead? Cause shit man I've been dead a whole bunch of times and I'm fine. I prayed to you but you're still not back. I went to church and all, made it holy. C'mon man, I need you. Fuck it man, you can't do this to me, you owe me."<p>

Sam only saw Dean, mumblings to himself like a nut-case, and he left him there heaped on the floor, and went into the cramped bathroom. He stared at himself in the mirror for a long moment. Sam's eyes were bleary and red, and he looked like one of those guys that you see on street corners that huddle under blankets and smile up at you with rotten teeth as you step over them.  
>A sobering thought, but Sam wasn't the one who was drunk. He pooled some water into his hands and splashed his face, and returned to help Dean.<br>He glimpsed the bedside clock as he grabbed Dean under the arms. It was 5:48AM. He unceremoniously dumped his older brother onto the other bed, then returned to his own, pissed off.

Sam understood why Dean drank, he really did. Losing Cas had been hard on him, and Sam got it, that Dean didn't deal with guilt well. So when he first starting frequenting bars more often than he used to, going to bed with a glass in his hand, Sam didn't comment. They had different ways of dealing with their crap.

But it got worse. The glass was exchanged for a bottle a night, of whatever was cheap, and Sam didn't know what he was meant to do. What, should he call Bobby, tell him that Dean was teetering into alcoholism? They didn't talk about it, but god knows Bobby was a drinker too, and he probably thought this was an acceptable way for Dean to cope, that it was fine to fill whatever hollow was inside his older brother with alcohol.  
>Sam didn't think it was fine, but he didn't know how to put a stop to it either.<br>He drove on, still angry, rain lashing against the windscreen, and his brother a wreak beside him.

"So, what's the latest freakshow?" Dean asked, a handful of hours later.  
>Neither of them had needed to explicitly state that they were not going to discuss what had happened earlier. You could call it their brotherly bond, but Sam preferred the term not picking a fight.<br>"Right, so monster of the week is this thingy that-" he started.  
>"A thingy?"<br>"Yes Dean, a thingy. There's no official term for it yet-"  
>"C'mon Sam though, a thingy though? Didn't you go to law school?"<br>"Anyway," Sam emphasised, trying to get back on track, "something ripped through a small desert town, targeting electricity poles, gnawing at them."  
>"Gnawing? Like a beaver?"<br>"No Dean, the size of the bite marks mean its jaw is massive."  
>"Oh. Any ideas? A freaky fanged monster that eats electricity?"<br>"That about sums it up."  
>"No idea man."<p>

The open land slid past them, and although it was pissing rain, this was the kind of place Dean could imagine monsters coming from, while desert birds watched overhead.  
>It was a weird image, and he quashed it down.<br>"Sammy, this may be a stupid question, but is the desert meant to get this kind of rain?" he asked, stretching.  
>"Not normally," Sam muttered laconically. He was still being a little bitch about last night.<br>"Right," Dean said, undeterred. "So, can I drive now?"  
>"No."<br>"Alright then."

"Hey Cas," Dean prayed silently, seeing as Sam wasn't talking. "Hey I been meaning to ask you though, do angels die? Like when the wings do that uhh thing, you know? You know.  
>So umm, do you go to heaven, is it like a done deal no matter what, no matter how bad you fuck up angels can always come home? Some reassurance. I guess I'd better read up on this shit, I'm useless. Sam'd know, but he's not talking right now.<br>Not much happening at this end buddy, you're not missing anything, but it's not so bad. Anyway, didn't really have anything to say really, so I'm gonna go now. Okay. Amen. Over and out."

Sam drove on, unaware, thank God. Dean was faintly embarrassed by the praying thing, but it wasn't like he was religious or anything- which wouldn't be a stretch, after seeing what he'd seen- it was just an unconventional way of phoning a friend, even if they weren't answering right now.


End file.
